Not Everything Can Be Fixed
by brokenroots
Summary: Tuesday night. The restaurant. Awkward Silence.


**Not Everything Can Be Fixed**  
><strong>Word Count<strong>: 1,604  
><strong>Rating<strong>: PG-13  
><strong>Pairing<strong>: Nico/Dani (friendship); implied references to Matt/Dani  
><strong>Spoilers:<strong> up to 1x11.  
><strong>Disclaimer<strong>: I don't own anything. I just break things.  
><strong>Summary:<strong> Tuesday night. The restaurant. Awkward Silence.  
><strong>Author's Note<strong>: I remember saying something about doing reaction pieces with the meetings in the restaurant. Well, I'm still processing the episode, so I've already done an alternate ending and now I've got this, and who knows what I'll do next...

* * *

><p><strong>Not Everything Can Be Fixed<strong>

"Can I get you anything? More wine?" Marcie asked. Dani looked up at her, for a change grateful for the woman's presence. Last time she'd found the girl obnoxious, but this time, she was a welcome relief from the awkward silence that hung over the table like a cloud.

"Yes, I'll take more," Dani said, and Nico actually managed to look at her this time, his eyes going to the still full glass on the table. "Make this one a red one, though."

"Okay," Marcie agreed pleasantly. "Anything for you, Mr. Careles?"

He shook his head. "I'm fine, thank you."

Marcie turned and almost bounced off to get Dani's wine. She reached for the glass on the table and took a large sip, practically choking on it. Nico looked at her. She sighed. "You haven't said anything all night."

"I know. Neither have you."

She sat up a little. Her discovery with her mother and the hoarder had been a wake-up call. Dani could have been that woman. She'd been pregnant at seventeen. Ray had "done the right thing" and married her, but she could have been forced to give up her baby. Ray Jay. Her son. She loved him with every bit of her soul, and she didn't really want to think about where she'd be if she'd had to give him up. She was still trying to figure out how to balance that revelation and letting her mother grieve in her life. She'd been willing to get rid of everything, insisting that it was her stuff. The memories weren't. Her marriage was not just about her. It was about her kids and even her mother. She was going to have to remember that. Marriage created bonds—family bonds—and those bonds didn't disappear with a piece of paper.

And then there was Matt...

And whatever the hell was bothering Nico.

Dani went for the wine again. She had been almost drunk off her ass the last time, and it had been fun. This wasn't fun. This was depressing. The wine didn't even take the edge off of it. "What's bothering you?"

He looked down at the table, his fingers fiddling with his fork for a moment. Finally, he looked up at her. "Last time we established rules."

"Yes," she agreed. "You said you'd be honest, but you could take as long as you wanted to answer. I suppose that explains why you didn't answer the seemingly simple question I asked when we sat down. I never knew _how are you_ was such a trick question."

"Have you ever had a chance to question a decision that would affect twenty years of your life?"

"I think about what would be different if I'd never married my jackass of an ex-husband about once a day," she answered immediately. She loved her kids, but sometimes she really wished she'd never met Ray. "What are you questioning?"

"It wasn't my decision. It was hers."

"Your ex-wife's?"

Nico let go of the fork and reached for his water glass. "Intellectually, I know that she made the best decision. We would never have been happy together. I could never have given her the life that she wanted. And yet... She remains my weakness."

Dani frowned. She wanted to drink the whole glass and make this conversation less stilted and painful, but she knew that he was opening up to her in a way that he would not have done with anyone else. She saw the guilt on his face and wondered just what made him feel that way—_oh, no._ _Nico, please. Not Mrs. Pittman._

"How so?" Dani asked, trying to control her reaction as much as possible. She drank more of the wine, trying to get that taste out of her mouth. Nico was human, but for all his mystery and questionable methods, he'd always been so... clean cut. He'd told Dani that he didn't lie. His job put him in a gray area most of the time, but he did do the right thing in the end. She didn't want to believe it.

"She called herself the situation that I couldn't fix."

Dani thought about that for a moment. "So... does that make you feel that you have been trying to fix everything else to... substitute for not being able to fix her?"

"I can fix anything. I pride myself on that."

"But you told me when I first started working for the Hawks that you couldn't fix TK."

Nico nodded. "I didn't have the right skills. You did. Do. However, I made it possible for you to use your skills, and they did work. I played my part in the solution. Sometimes all I need to do is put the right people in the same place at the same time."

Dani looked at him. "Are you taking credit for my success, then?"

"Of course not. I couldn't do what you do. I... facilitate things. Arrange them."

"Control them?"

Nico frowned at her. She held up a hand. "Before you start arguing with me, a lot of what you do is about control. Actually, it _all _is. You are a singular force trying to control everything that is chaos in the world around you. You put things back in order, get people where they need to be or with the person they need to be with. It wouldn't surprise me if you have a lot of... quirks and compulsions as well, needing to feel in control like Booz does."

"I don't have a bunch of rituals that I have to follow before I leave my house."

"How many times do you check your phone a day?"

He looked down at the table, and Marcie finally returned with the wine. She set it down and took the now empty glass Dani had finished. She hesitated, biting her lip and fidgeting a little. "Mr. Careles, should I get you one of—"

"Yes, please, Marcie," Nico said, and the girl left again. Dani watched her leave and turned back to Nico. "Would you stop reading so much into her behavior? She's not the woman in question."

"No, but she seems to know you really well. What exactly is she bringing you?"

"A drink."

"But she knows you well enough to recognize the 'need' for a drink."

"I told you this was my Tuesday night restaurant."

Dani nodded. Yes, it was. He hadn't lied about that. She no longer thought he'd paid Marcie off in any way. Still, she didn't like what she was seeing. "Nico, I don't know that drinking is what you really need to do right now."

"Alcohol generally leads to a loss of control. If I'm so controlling, shouldn't I let go of that sometime?"

"Not with alcohol. That's not a solution to the real problem. That's going to let you think you've let go for the short time it affects your judgment, and in the morning, you'll wake up hating yourself for doing it. Am I wrong about that cycle?"

Nico shook his head. "No. That is why I generally sit with the glass in front of me without drinking it."

"Were you... an alcoholic?"

"There is a firestorm coming," he began, completely ignoring her question. "Right now, I'm the only one that knows about it. There are rumors, but nothing is fact except what I know. I know too much. A part of me wants to believe what must be a lie to be true—but at the same time, I want nothing to do with it. I don't know that I have ever been more conflicted in my life. Nor, I expect, have you."

"What?"

"Donnally."

"You really do know too much," Dani shook her head, not wanting to think about how he could possibly have known about that. She grimaced. "Wait. Wait, you're trying to distract me now. Whatever firestorm that you see coming, that is bigger than my personal life."

"I've already said as much as I can say."

"No," she disagreed immediately, catching his arm before he could get up from the table. "You've said as much as you're _willing _to say. Nico, you know me. You know the lengths I go to in order to protect my patients' privacy. I do the same for my friends. You _can _talk to me."

His eyes went to the floor instead of meeting up with hers. "I appreciate your offer, Dr. Santino."

"Dani."

"If you're going to treat me as one of your patients, I think we'll stick with formal address. Good night, Doctor," he said, standing up. He almost dragged her with him as he did, and she half-fell out of her chair. He caught the chair, and she took hold of his suit jacket.

"I was _not _treating you like a patient. Yes, I have a habit of analyzing my friends and my children in addition to my patients. It's not something I'm proud of, but damn it, you _are _my friend, Nico. You are also in crisis. Don't let yourself drown in it. You don't have to do this on your own."

He gave her a tired half-smile. "She was wrong about one thing. She's not the only thing I can't fix."

"Not everything can be fixed."

"I know. I'm living proof of that."


End file.
